


A Warm Welcome

by Wildrivver



Series: Drawn to you [1]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Acceptance, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, First Meetings, Fluff, Found Family, Happy, M/M, Non-Binary Feuilly, Non-Binary Jean Prouvaire, Trans Grantaire, an antidote to current events, bonding over shared interests
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-16
Updated: 2020-06-16
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:35:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,026
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24758668
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Wildrivver/pseuds/Wildrivver
Summary: Grantaire hesitated by the door to the Musain. The flyer in his pocket, which he had snatched off the student union notice board, said the social was due to start at 7pm. It was now 7.15.Deciding that it was now or never he took a deep breath to steady himself and pushed the door open.*Grantaire attends his first meeting of the Friends of the ABC.
Relationships: Beginning of Enjolras/Grantaire
Series: Drawn to you [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2115618
Comments: 4
Kudos: 24





	A Warm Welcome

Grantaire hesitated by the door to the Musain. The flyer in his pocket, which he had snatched off the student union notice board, said the social was due to start at 7pm. It was now 7.15. He hadn’t known if people would be on time and so had taken a walk round the block first so that he wouldn’t be the first to arrive. Deciding that it was either now or never he took a deep breath to steady himself and pushed the door open. 

He was met by the inviting low hum of voices and welcoming smell of coffee. He glanced around the room, searching for the group he had come to meet. There were various people sat around tables, talking over their cakes and drinks. In the corner was a large group taking up sever tables which had been pushed together. That had to be them.

He made his way across to them before he could second guess himself. As he drew closer some of the group noticed and waved him over.

“Are you...” he began timidly.

“The friends of the ABC?” one of the group offered helpfully. He had wild brown curly hair, tan skin and a wide inviting smile. “Yeah, that’s us, pull up a chair. I’m Courfeyrac by the way.”

He did as instructed and perches on a chair at the corner of the table. “Grantaire,” he replied.

“Well good to meet you. Here, have a name tag. Feel free to put down your name, pronouns or anything else you want.” He handed over a role of sticky labels and a marker. Grantaire quickly glanced around the table and saw that most people had put their pronouns under their name. He looked down at his own and drew a capital R in looping calligraphy and then paused. With another deep breath he wrote “he/him” for the first time outside his own journal before peeling it off and sticking it on his chest.

He felt like there was a pause while he held his breath, waiting for someone to say something or question him. But nothing happened. Courfeyrac simply glanced at it and then gestured around the group. “Let me introduce you to a few people. This is Bahorel,” he gestured to a large intimidating guy opposite them, who sported many tattoos and an impressive beard. “Don’t worry, he’s a big softly really. And Jehan,” They had long limbs, fine features and shoulder length coppery hair tied back in a braid. They wore a purple and yellow floral sweatshirt and smiled and waved when introduced. Courfeyrac continued to nod to people and name them but Grantaire soon lost track. “Don’t worry about remembering everyone’s names, I know there’s a lot of us, hence the name tags. Anyway, what do you do to occupy your days?”

“Erm...I study art?”

“No way, remind me to introduce you to Feuilly when they arrive, they make these amazing fans. That sounds weird but they are legit works of art.”

He remained quiet as he listened to the conversations taking place around him. It was clear that everyone in the group were close friends. He wondered if they accepting new members quickly of if he would always continue to feel like an outside and a new comer even if he continued to attend more frequently.

After about half an hour, Grantaire excused himself to go and get a drink. He returned with a coffee to find his seat had been taken by a guy with long blond hair tied up in a messy bun. He was talking animatedly to Courfeyrac, it was clear they knew each other very well.

Grantaire hung back, not wanting to interrupt, but Jehan noticed him and nudged Courfeyrac.

“Sorry, Enjolras, that seat was already taken,” he said.

“Oh sorry,” the other man apologised. “I didn’t realise.” He got to his feet hurriedly and turned to Grantaire. “I was just filling Courf in on something. I’m Enjolras, one of the organisers.” Grantaire just started up at him. He was one of the most beautiful humans he had ever seen. He was wearing a shirt and tie but the tie had been loosened and his top buttons lay undone. Piercing blue eyes stared from a soft angelic face framed by stands of hair which had tumbled loose from their tie. “Sorry I wasn’t here earlier but a couple of us had a meeting with one of the Deans. I hope everyone has been welcoming.”

Grantaire shook himself back to reality. “Oh yeah, they have, thanks.”

“Oh and here comes Combeferre, my second in command” he indicated a guy making his way across to them carrying two mugs of tea. He had deep brown skin and wore round wire rimmed glasses. He was also wearing a button up shirt and smart looking jumper. Grantaire assumed it was due to the meeting they had come from but somehow he had managed to arrive not looking half as dishevelled as Enjolras.

“Hey, I thought I was your second in command,” Courfeyrac protested, leaping to his feet and hooking his elbow around Combeferre’s neck.

“Whoa, hot drinks!” Combeferre yelped, trying not to spill the tea he was carrying.

“Let me help with that,” Courfeyrac took one of the mugs and took a sip.

“And that was meant for Enjolras!”

“it’s ok, we’ll share, it’s the least he can do for demoting me from second in command.”

“Fine,” Enjolras huffed in frustration. “You can both be my seconds in command. I’m going to talk to someone sane. Nice to meet you Grantaire, I hope you decide to come again.”

“Thank you, I think I will.” He had been unsure initially if this group would be for him, from the outside it seemed too overly political, but meeting them, they seemed like a really nice group of people and hearing Enjolras say he hoped he would come again clinched it, he would definitely be coming back.

Enjolras went to greet those sat at the other end of the table and Grantaire sat back down in his original seat. Combeferre looked like he was going to follow Enjolras but Courfeyrac insisted they could share a chair and pushed him down and climbed into his lap before he could protest. Combeferre just resigned himself with the look of one who knew there was no use fighting Courfeyrac when he had an idea in his head.

“So, what do you two do?” he asked, turning back to Jehan and Bahorel.

“I study English literature and creative writing,” Jehan answered. “And Bahorel here studies philosophy.”

He must have looked surprised because Bahorel cracked a smile. “What, just because I spend a lot of time at the boxing gym, doesn’t mean I’m stupid.”

“No of course not,” Grantaire said. “Boxing? That’s really cool. I’ve always wanted to give it a go but I’ve never really had the chance and I don’t really go the gym any more so...” he trailed off, not wanting to go into too many details about why.

“Well if you ever want to come with me just give me a shout. I’d be more than happy to take you and show you how to get started.”

“Thanks, that would be cool.”

“Do it!” Jehan encouraged. “Oh, there’s Feuilly. Feuilly!” They shouted waving someone else over. They have flame red ginger hair which was cut short around the sides and longer on top and were wearing baggy denim dungarees, only clasped on one shoulder with large doc martin boots. “Hey, this is Grantaire, he does art, and you two should talk.”

“Oh yeah?” Feuilly pulled up a chair and, straddling it the wrong way round, crossed their arms across the top of the back. “What sort of art do you do?”

“Oh, a bit of everything really, I haven’t really settled on a specialism yet. I do a lot of drawing, photography, I really like painting.”

“Water colours, acrylics?” Feuilly asked seeming genuinely interested in the subject.

“Oils,” Grantaire answered.

“I could never stand the fumes,” Feuilly wrinkled their noise as though they could smell the paint and thinner in the cafe.

“I like how the colures blend, and it gives you enough time to get things right before it dries. So what do you do? Courfeyrac mentioned something about fans? What department do you do that in?” Grantaire asked.

“I’m not at university,” they replied. “I work a couple or part time jobs and trade at art fairs and markets on the weekends. I’ve always been more interested in crafts and more traditional practices like weaving and yeah, fans. I’ll show you.” They pull out their phone and open instagram.

“Wow. These are incredible!” Grantaire exclaimed as he scrolled through the pictures. The fans had full scenes and landscapes on them. He had no idea how Feuilly had managed to put so much detail into each piece. He hands their phone back and gets his own out to follow the account. When Feuilly gets the notification they click though and look at some of Grantaire’s pieces.

“I really like your style,” they said, but where as their feed was clearly a well curated assortment of images, Grantaire’s account was rougher, most of the paintings unfinished. It doesn’t look professional and usually he doesn’t show people, but hearing Feuilly’s encouragement he feels a tiny spark of pride.

They talked for a little while longer about different techniques and then got drawn back into a discussion going on further down the table. Thing were causal and he didn’t feel pressured to talk more than he was comfortable. After a couple of hours the group began to disperse. When most people seemed to be going he thanked Courfeyrac for introducing him to everyone and Combeferre insisted that he was welcome back any time. He also added him to their facebook group so he could easily see their events.

He walked home feeling light, like he could run the whole way and just keep going. He didn’t remember the last time he felt so free. He collapsed on his bed when he got in and scrolled through the facebook group. There was a post about a local organisation who distributed donated binders and he bookmarked them, wondering if he could request one.

He looked through their up and coming events. As well as the occasional social, like the one he had just attended, they also held regular structured meetings and often attended protests and other larger events together. It still felt too overtly political for him, but if it meant spending more time in such an accepting environment he knew he would attend, and anyway, he had told Enjolras that he would.

They had only spoken for five minutes but he couldn’t stop thinking about him. He found a post he had made on the facebook page and followed it to his profile. Of course his profile picture was of him at a protest holding up a placard with a pride flag wrapped around his wrest. Was that a trickle of blood on the side of his face? He clicked on the picture to enlarge it. Enjolras’s gentle face was transformed into a mask of passionate anger. Grantaire was mesmerised. He saved the picture to his phone, ignoring the voice in his head which said he was being a creep, and scrolled further down his profile. There were a lot of public posts, all of them political, lots of news articles and petitions. Enjolras clearly used his profile to share his beliefs. Before he could accidentally like a post from two years before he scrolled back to the top and clicked to add him. He then went though and found the others who he had talked to and sent them requests as well. Finally he sent a message to Bahorel, saying it was really cool meeting him and he would really like it if he wouldn’t mind taking him boxing.

He didn’t fall asleep for several more hours, his mind was still buzzing with everything that had happened, but when he did he slept better than he had in a long time.

**Author's Note:**

> I live in the UK and this week has not been great for trans people. Apparently the way I cope is by writing happier stories. Anyway, this is a bit of a prequel to a much longer fic, Drawn to You, but it can be read on its own. If you enjoyed it please let me know by leaving a comment or kudos.


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